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Just sat down at my computer and Vista told me there was updates available. When I checked, there was 5 hotfixes and 2 ultimate extras. The Ultimate extras that were available to me are the Bitlocker and Holdem Poker. The updates included application compatibility fixes, IE phishing filter fix, windows search fix, an error reporting fix, and an activation fix. My guess is that there will be more either in the next week or I'm sure there will be some for MS's fixit Tuesday.

My main computer is currently running Windows XP Pro and I am looking to purchase Vista when it comes out. The copy of XP that I have now is an upgrade cd since I have a retail Win98. Can I get Vista upgrade for my WinXP upgrade?? If so, after I upgrade the computer to Vista, can I then use the WinXP on my other computer??

This thread is an interesting read. I actually enjoyed the debate on whether defragmentation software is needed as much as it used to be. IMHO, I believe the answer is yes AND no. I'm sure many users today have more than one partition and/or drives on their computer. One drive/partition hold the OS, and the others hold data. The partition/drive holding the OS should be defragmented quite frequently as their are always many files that are updated, added, or deleted. That is a given. But... The other partitions that hold data, may or may not need defragmentation. For example, on one of my drives, I hold just media. The whole drive has nothing but music and video (technically it's a RAID array, but back to the point). As I add to this drive, I adjust tags and information and then I run one pass with something like Diskkeeper. Two or three weeks later, there is still zero to very little defragmentation since all I've done is read from the drive. As far as my preference, I still choose Diskkeeper. It has features that I personally like and it also helps that I've used it for so long that I'm comfortable with it. Another small reason is because they are the ones that built Windows built in defragmenter. So if Microsoft can trust the software enough to ship it within Windows, it can't be all too bad. (Somewhat of a oxymoron since Windows itself doesn't always work right )

I'm curious to this solution also. I've had this exact problem in the past and now I have a problem getting Vista to boot on certain configurations on my current setup. Here is one example: I have 3 different RAID controllers available in my PC...nvRAID, Silicon's 3114 controller, and a Highpoint 1740 controller. The first 2 are onboard and the latter is a PCI card. I have 4 drives connected to the Highpoint controller in a RAID 5. No matter what, this stays since it has all my backups, media, etc on it. Now orginally, I had the other 3 drives conncected to the nvRAID controller in a RAID 0 and I wanted to boot off of that. Windows XP would install and run just fine with that configuration, but no luck with Vista. I would get as far as going through the intial setup and the copying of files, but after the first reboot, it would run the the BIOS screens and then just sit there, not booting to anything. I did have it going at one point (not sure what I did different), but Vista said that the one drive needed to go through checkdisk. After it went through the checkdisk, it stopped booting again. Does all of this have to do with the way partitions are setup and what is or isn't set active...or even which partitions are primary and extended. I've also always wondered why Windows always seems to assign drive letter C: to the onboard IDE primary even though I may use a RAID controller and am booting to that. Hope I'm not asking too many questions. Is there somewhere I can maybe read more about this and get a better understanding of the way a system boots and the way Windows mounts drives and partitions??

I'm wondering if this is part of the reason my newest power supply stopped working. It was working just fine, but the other day when I went to turn it on, nothing nothing happened. I tried a spare power supply I had and it started right up. My system has 7 hard drives (4x320 + 3x200), an Opteron 170 (currently at stock 2.0Ghz), 2 GB DDR RAM, Geforce 6600GT, and in addition to the processer fan, I have 4 120mm fans in the case. All this was powered by a Antec 450 watt smartpower. Should this system have a 500+ watt power supply? I have already looked at a few possibly replacements at Newegg. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?...N82E16817371002 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?...N82E16817153028 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?...N82E16817341001 Any suggestions? I use this system mainly as my HTPC so I'd like to keep the noise level down as much as possible. (Believe it or not, even with all the hard drives and the fans, it isn't too loud.)

Unfortunately, these are not "Final" drivers. These are still basically test drivers with limited functionality. Here is an excerpt from Nvidia's site: "NVIDIA has released the following WHQL certified drivers for use with Windows Vista RTM that will enable you to test the basic features and capabilities of the new operating system.: Reading through the release notes, there are still a lot of funtionalites still not available in the driver. The main ones that caught my attention are no support for SLI and you cannot make custom resolutions.

I agree with the other about getting a motherboard with integrated components. As far as choosing a manufacturer for the board, Gigabyte and MSI are both build quality boards. I have computers using one from each and I haven't had any problems from either. If I had to choose, I would pick Gigabyte for you. The motherboards are normally feature rich and are generally quite stable. I think what would be most important would be to look at offerings from both and compare features and prices. They'll be pretty close, but you might find something that you particularly like about a motherboard.

Pertaining to the differences in performance between 32-bit and 64-bit: I have run both versions on my desktop. I have an Opteron 170 dual core at the stock 2.0 Ghz with 2 gigs of memory, a 1.2 TB RAID 0 (4x320), and a Nvidia 7600GT. In both cases, I noticed little to no difference in performance. I would say that overall, the 32-bit worked better of the two. Applications were more compatible and I also have a tuner card that wouldn't work in the 64-bit version. As for the original problem, it's hard to say if it is even a bad burn. I have always burned the different builds of Vista on a DVD-RW at 4x speed with no problems. What he could do is reburn the DVD and have the burning application verify the disc when it's done. As for my opinion, the slowdown he might be experiencing might be in that early part after an install. I have noticed that Vista keeps things quite active in the background for the first while after an install. I'm thinking that between defragging and other services learning how you use the computer, it affects performance till things settle in. It is also good to remember that these are all pre-RTM builds and much of the debugging is still turned on.

If you have a legitimate key, you can use any Media Center install disc. This would be one of the few times that I would recommend either borrowing a friend's disc if available or even getting it through bittorrent/usenet. The main difference being that you use your own legal key. You should have no problem reinstalling and hopefully activating Windows. The main exception being that many times, when replacing something as major as a motherboard, Windows will not always reactivate and will require that dreaded call to Microsoft. Good luck!!

I guess the best way to tell is by trial and error. I do the format and reinstall enough on my computer, maybe the next time, I'll use the drivers and see how it goes. The main 2 things I'll look for are stability and performance issues. I've always been one to like the extra performance, but it does a person little good if the computer crashes or has "hiccups". If anyone is interested, I'll do a little experimenting this weekend and will post my results.

I've always been curious as to the quality of the drivers on Windows Update. Right now, it shows an update for my Silicon Image 3114 controller, Nvidia audio controller, my monitor, and my Dlink gigabit ethernet. When I look at the details, drivers like the 3114 and the Nvidia audio have dates as recent as last month (May). Generally speaking, I've always used the most recent drivers directly from the manufactures website. Most times, I find them drivers most stable and of course, up to date. I know that a person shouldn't really try to fix something that isn't broken, but I was just curious about these drivers and the quality of them. Any input and/or experience with them would be greatly appreciated.

I don't have your exact CPU (1900+), but I do have an 1800+ in one of my machines. If I guess correctly, I've had it for about 2 years now. For pretty much that whole time, it idles around 44C/112F and under load, it gets to about 52C/125F. With these temps, I've never had any stability issues in the 2 years I've had it. IMHO, instead of cutting up or spending a lot of time and money on your current case, you might find it easier to purchase a new one. You can find a pretty good selection of cases under $50 that possibly have better cooling than your current case. Some will probably have mounts for 120mm fans. Overall, a 1900+ is getting pretty outdated. If this is your main PC, I wouldn't spend much time or money on it at all. For about $400-$500, you can build a new machine that darn near doubles in performance. You can always do like I did and use the older machine (I'm writing this on the 1800+ right now) for email and surfing the web. I use the better machines for more power hungry applications.

I'm looking at getting an opteron 170 dual core myself and I was wonder what would be some good memory. I don't plan on going for a huge overclock as I'd like to stay with the stock cooler. From what I've read, I should get roughly 2.5 ghz fairly easy, even with the stock cooler. So far, I'm looking at getting 2 gigs of Patriot PC3200 memory that has an advertised rating of 2-3-2-5 at 2.6v. Should that work ok? I'd like to stay with Patriot as I've had really good luck with their memory.

You also could just simply use WinXP's Backup.

Joshua...AKA Josh...AKA Joshy (nieces and nephews)